Non-sandy desert..St.Katherine

Hmm..so here I am still in London..at artati's place, 4more hours before i have to leave to catch my flight back home frm heathrow :)
After watching 6 episodes of desperate housewives 2nd season and ate chocolates..thinking wht shd i do now, decided to continue my story abt egypt. My last entry was abt Ras Mohammed, which was basically where we spent 3weeks diving and id-ing fishes.. now story continued, the 4th week we all (me maya ninghn alex) went to the desert base camp of opwall in St.Katherine Protectorate. Abt 4 hrs car journey frm Ras.. which was bloody hot and windy. My cheeks actually felt numb the moment we got off frm e car. We left Ras saturday morning..after endless goodbys to everyone, giving out postcards to all the staff..Oh, forgot to write abt the car break down! well, basically on our last nite in Ras..we went to town (Sharm) to withdraw cash & use internt (found our exam results! i was a bit dissapointed when i 1st found out abt my results, but after a while then i can't b bothered, anw i tried my best & worked hard & yep i managed to reach my aim which was at least to get 4 B's and no D's. so not bad at all trish). Ok so then we were on our way back to camp..when suddeny the car machine just died.. tutns out it got no petrol! so hehe there we were stuck in e middle of this dark empty road..with desert/sands/sea ard us..hmm.. ahmed called the camp and they sent anthr car to pick us up. :)

So ok back to the desert..we arrived in Fox Camp ard 3pm saturday..ate lunch. Met toby (again) there lol. The eggplant was soo yummy! then a quick trip to town to the cafe & shisha..drank karkadea (hibiscus tea) ..get to know rebecca alanna sam (all e staff in st.Kat are much more approachable compared to Ras i think, maybe also got such a small group of us only). Fox camp was soo different than Ras! everything is actually close together (aka : toilet/rooms/sitting area/lecture room). Met all e egyptian students as well.. Slept outside wit mosquito nets! amazingly effective i must say :). Nxt day : sunday..went to St.Katherine monastery which is where the famous 'burning bush' is situated.. its quite unimpressive i think..also only such a small part of the monastery is open for public, which is quite a shame since e monastery itsels is so big..but it is still a working monastery..so oh well. Saw this room full of the skeletons of monks. Then did a practice walk in Ramadan... which took us more thn 2 hrs bcos some of them r collecting microbio samples i think.. Saw these hyraxes (huge hamster like animals).. walked back down..then slept early as we're going to set off for the desert tmr.

Tuesday we then set off to the desert.. abt 15 min car ride (our big bags go w the cars/camels) and our day-bags plus water we carry ourselves.. Arrive at campsite after abt 30 min hike.. (am so gonna invest in hiking boots nxt time!). Our campsite is in this Wadi (wadi = river area in winter..but dry in summer). The desert is not sandy plains like wht i imagined..its more like rocky desert. Choose our sleeping site..(open areas! to avoid scorpions etc..plus the fact tht Sam, our desert leader, got stung by scorpion 2 weeks ago didn't realy help). Toilets = shovel, matches, toilet papers. V.v vital things to always carry ard : 3 litres of water at least..hat (maya's fowery hat! lol..v.comfy though)..rehydro sachets.

Helped alanna (bat scientist, frm imperial, she knew Lamb!!! hopefully can see her ard IC nxt term. she's v.cool) did batting at nite..: set up the mist nets..and wait ard.. for bats. apparently bats in egypt are like..small. and totally undertudied. only 3 scientists had ever study bats in egypt in these past 50yrs! Caught 3 bats tht nite. They'r soo sma but got cute (mouse-like) longish faces..too bad can't hold them cos i got no idea whether my rabies jab is still effective or not. she measured their height/weight/etc//record their sound (tongue-clicking to echolocate).

Nxt day : Wed moning woke up at 4.30am.. omg felt so stiff due to sleeping on my sleeping bag and got no roll mat. Amzingly all managed to woke up. had a bit of tea. Left the camp ard 6am wit rebecca's plant group. Me ning alex matya toby dave all in plant group tht morning. Did a bit of trekking..did plant transects of 25 m.. 5 quadrats. Lucky Ghada, this girl in mine n alex's group, knew most of e plants.. so we finished way faster thn the rest. Ate our breakfast. Continue to walk and did a 2nd transect. Then head back to camp ard lunchtime as it gets too hot to walk. Stay ard in camp and rebecca hosted this dung-collecting competition for all of us (nasser collected this unbelieveably HUGE bag of shit)..winner gets coke. lol. anw its only herbivore dungs..so its harmless.. plus as i'm so used collecting horses' shit, so its nothing much for me. hehe.
Helped alanna with batting again tht nite.. but we didn't managed to get many bats. we went ard to these old empty stone houses where we set up flick nets and caught the bats who nested inside the houses. Much more effective method. Caught insect bats which got diff faces thn fruit ones. Uglier looking i must say. :) Got a bit early nite. Collapsed wit exhaustion. Also dinner is basically eat in the dark while trying to figure out wht ur actually eating, but since we're all so hungry, all tasted good. A bit cold at nite compared to Ras.

Thursday : morning : plants again..fast as usual. Lunchtime at camp. Went batting ard 4 pm..where we hiked up to these stone caves (Nasser is the bedouin who lead us ard..he knew the area well). Slipped and scratch my knee a bit (hiking boots!). At this one cave, ninghn,alex,n maya managed to caught 2 bats which are new species!! think one of the bat was attracted esp 2 alex lol. Also got this one big stone, where all of us tried to climb it..to prove our rock-climbing skills? us girls are more agile hehe.. Walked back. Set up 3 mist nests at nite, but didn't caught any bats anymore tht nite. Ended up sitiing there on a big stone and talk nonsense, prob scaring all e bats away. plus King toby and tubinaria kingdom lol.

Friday : last day in desert. Did one plant transect..as usual, me ghada alex finished super fast. hehe. Maya didn't feel to well..stomach upset i think. Not surprising since the water we drank were taken frm this dodgy..looking..well.. near the camel (camels always looked like they're smiling). Hike back down after did camp-clean ups..pretty long trekking down.. ound out tht i drank a LOT..like can finish 1.5 l of water in 45 min. Tired and dirty (no shower for 4 days)..back to Fox camp. Showered, rested :)
Signed off frm Opwall officially at 2pm (me ning alex toby dave) as we a want to climb mt.Sinai (opwal didn't allow if we're still their volunteers, dun ask me why). Feels like we're freed! hehe. Went to town, internet.. went bar/hotel crawing to get beers (stella : not v.nice..sakaara beer : nicer..both are local beers). drank a bit. alcohol felt pretty good after 5 weeks wt out it. Then went to eat pizza! oven baked and tasted quite nice i think. took them 45 min to prepare it! went to Morgen Land and get dressed up in bedouin clothes..sang n dance n pics. till ard 11pm. Went back to fox camp, hoping to get a bit of sleep before we set off to climb sinai at 1am. Sadly can't realy get any rest. Prepared super warm clothes plus loads of water. i actually carry like 4.5 l of water.

Started our hike up mt.sinai at 1 am.. wit Ismail as the park ranger who act as our guide. pretty big group : me ning alex toby dave ismai yoesef and 2 other guys. Took the route thr Ramadan & Wadi abein, camle track, then the 750-odd steps up to the peak. Felt quite tired at times but found out tht i can catch my breath quickly even wit only a short rest,pretty good. Quite nice to hike in the dark, wit ony torches shining the groung. Stars are amazing! they just seems soo bright and near! Got this huge spurt of energy when heard we almst reached the top! the steps are killers..wah so tiring, but just like ninghn said, take it one step at e time. Reach the peak ard 4 am.. found this BEST spot to seat. Rent blankets and mattres (smelled like camels lol). Lucky me n ninghn got our thick winter fleece, it was bloody freezing!!! can't imagine how aex can survive in shorts n thin jacket! toby n dave got their sleeping bags wit them, smart. Waited abt 1 hr. Then at 5, the horizon just turns orangey and got htis one orangey strip..wit the sinai mountains as the background..omg omg sooo beatiful! too bad my camer was useless in e dark, so can't take any decent pics of of it. Got this italian gropu of ppl singin christian songs..which made the atmosphere soo great. It really2 seem so surreal. The scenery..the way the skies seems to slowly changed colour frm dark-orangey-yellow. Then at 6 am sun finaly breaks, looked liek this perfectly round egg yolk, super yellow and round and perfect..slowly came up and rise. wahh.. it truly is the best sunrise i've ever witnessed. still got the memory clear in my head even till now. Totally no regret to go up to mt.sinai.Also while watching the sunrise, made me think tht actuay in life, there are ony a few things tht really really matters : friends, famiy, love. Nothing much else..so dun think life is too complicated..life is very simple, just cherish those 3 things and take good care of it if u alrd found all those things..dunno why this thought crossed my mind tht time. The hike down was better, we took the 3500-odd steps of penance which carried us straight nxt to the st.Katherine monastery. All ppl took tht route, pretty crowded. As usual, am taking my own sweet slow time in order tob sure i didn't slip. hehe. well..this is my 2nd hike so far after snowdonia :) Ismai was a good leader, he kept waiting for me as i'm v.v.sloow compared to other. It was at times ike tht i wished i was a mountain goat! the bedouins is just amazing, they ust hop frm rocks to rocks!
Supremey tired back to fox camp..showered..then got 2hrs of sleep..then we head back to Ras (4 hrs super hot car journye again)..stay in Ras for 3-4 hrs..so sad..now it's soo empty in ras. only got gerben steve joe and 4volunteers. Totaly savouring all the last minutes moments in Ras. Watching the last sunset. Staring at the clear blue red sea. It all has come to an end.

Me ning dave toby maya dave mark are all on e same 2 flights back home..i slept all e way back to London. Arr in gatwick ard 2..waited ard till 5 wit ning toby dave.. too coach back to Victoria.. took bus to artati's. then went shopping. then sept and slept. Can't believe those 5 weeks are over. Its just all so amazing. Had such good times. Totally great.